to clear them up. Having traveled out with the intention of seeking
a reconciliation she might have thought it due to him to accept
evil tidings of him only from his own lips. Always, he knew, she had
absolutely trusted in his loyalty and faithfulness to her. Perhaps then,
even though she had put him out of her life, she was unable to believe
that he had tried to forget her in unfaithfulness. Perhaps that was the
true explanation of her conduct.

Could he then save himself from destruction by a great lie?

He sat pondering that problem, oblivious of time. Could he lie to
Rosamund? All his long bitterness against her for the moment was gone,
driven out by his self-condemnation. A great love must forgive. It
cannot help itself. It carries within it, as a child is carried in the
womb, the sweet burden of divinity, and shares in the attributes of
God. So it was with Dion on that night as he sat in his dingy room. And
presently his soul rejected the lie he had abominably thought of. He
knew he could not tell Rosamund a life. Then what was he to do?

He drew out of a drawer a piece of letter paper, dipped a pen in ink.
He had a mind to write the horrible truth which he could surely never
speak.

"I have received your letter," he wrote, in a blurred and unsteady
handwriting. Then he stopped. He stared at the paper, pushed it away
from him, and got up. He could not write the truth. He went to the
window and looked out into the dark night. Here and there he saw faint
lights. But Stamboul was almost hidden in the gloom, a city rather
suggested by its shadow than actually visible. The Golden Horn was a
tangled mystery. There were some withdrawn stars.

Should he not reply to Rosamund's letter? If she had heard rumors about
his life would not his silence convey to her the fact that they were
true? He had perhaps only to do nothing and Rosamund would understand
and--would leave Constantinople.

The blackness which shrouded Stamboul suddenly seemed to him to become
more solid, impregnable. He felt that his own life would be drowned in
blackness if Rosamund went away. And abruptly he knew that he must see
her. Whatever the cost, whatever the shame and bitterness, he must see
her at once. He would tell her, or try to tell her, what he had been
through, what he had suffered, why he had done what he had done.
Possibly she would be able to understand. If only he could find the
words that would give her the inner truth perhaps they